Relationship Between Th17Cell And IL-17in Liver Transplant Rejection And Tolerance

Objective To study the function expression and significance of Th17cell andIL-17in liver transplant rejection and tolerance.Methods A total of28liver transplant patients admitted in the second hospital ofdalian medical university from January2011to December2012underwent needlebiopsy for the transplanted hepatic tissue. We divided the patients into two groups.Acute rejection group(6cases) and stable-graft group (22cases). In addition, weenlisted15healthy people in the study who were regarded as control. Acute rejectiongroup and stable-graft group undergo routine pathological inspection; On thepost-operative day (POD)3and7, we tested the serum IL-17level using enzyme-linkedimmunosorbent assay and measured the frequencies of Th17cells in CD45+Tlymphocyte by flow cytometry.Results1. Pathological examination showed an increased severity of graft rejection withthe post-transplantation time. Pathological changes of the7days after surgery is moreserious compared with the3days.2.The acute rejection group showed more infiltrating Th17cells in the grafts onPOD3and POD7(P<0.05) compared to stable-graft group and healthy group, and thecell number was significantly greater on POD7(P<0.05); the result is similar betweenstable-graft group and healthy group (P＞0.05).3. Compared to stable-graft group and healthy group, the acute rejection groupshowed a significantly higher level of serum IL-17on POD3and POD7(P<0.05), andthe level of IL-17is significantly higher on POD7than on POD3(P<0.05);4. compared to healthy group, the stable-graft group showed a significantly higherlevel of serum IL-17on POD3and POD7(P<0.05), but the level of IL-17is similar onPOD7and on POD3(P＞0.05).Conclusions Thl7cells and IL-17may play an important role in the development of liver graft rejection. Th17cells and IL-17may serve as a potential specific indicatorfor predicting allograft rejection.